


A Tale of Two Brothers

by Tiz



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Brothers, Canon-Typical Violence, Drabble Collection, F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-04-07 20:11:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4276380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tiz/pseuds/Tiz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A serie of short drabbles from the years the Hawke Brothers were in Kirkwall. Each chapter is told from both their PoV.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Tale of Two Brothers

 

The house smells putrid.

I say nothing. Uncle Gamlen is grumbling something. I try to pay attention, but I am hot and nauseous. I shake my head and try to smile at Gamlen. He doesn’t have to give us shelter after all. For three days I had hoped he wouldn’t come to pick us up at all. Then Mother would have understood how bad an idea her coming back to Kirkwall was, and we could go somewhere else.

No such luck.

“That room there has two cots, the boys can go there. And you and the soldier can sleep in that other one. I’ll take the central room.”

Carver clenches his jaw in being referred as a boy. I try to find his gaze, but his eyes remain looking stubbornly on the walls.

I relent and nod and walk toward the pointed room. The door creaks. The smell is musty and moldy and like rat droppings.

The two cots are little more than old straw with a burlap sack thrown over. Probably crawling with fleas.

Carver throws his stuff on the ground and put his broadsword against the wall, with care.

I take the cots and bring them in the main room. Gamlen looks up at me and glares. I throw the hay in the fire, and put the burlap sack to smoke to kill the eggs and fleas. We cannot afford to get sick by flea-bite.

Carver is glaring at me from the threshold. Why, I do not know.

“That was our beds you just burnt, brother. You may relish sleeping on the ground but I don’t.” He growls. Ah. Of course.

“Tomorrow we start with Athenril. I am going to get some new hay.”

Gamlen snickers, like I have just said something very funny. I can hear Mother and Aveline in the other room.

Mother should have shared that room with Bethany. She should have been here.  ~~Why her? Why not me?~~

I close my eyes. My throath is too tight.  I am suffocating.

I shake my head. This is not  **useful**. I must be of some  **use**.

I go out.

I do find fresh hay and I manage to earn enough coin to buy some food by caring for horses. At least that night Carver and I sleep on clean beds and we all have food in our stomach.

It is a beginning.

~~Not for Bethany.~~

* * *

 

The hovel smells like shit.

I grit my teeth. “Uncle” Gamlen is grumbling something, but I couldn’t care less. He should not have come at all. All he has done is selling us into slavery for a whole year.

I walk into the room that I’ll have to share with Gawain. As in everything else was not enough. The room is rancid, the smell almost making me gag. Almost like darkspawn, but not quite. Nothing smell as bad as they do.

No. I do not want to think about darkspawn.

Gawain has already picked up all the hay and sack. I am about to ask what for when he throws everything in the fire.

“That was our beds you just burnt, brother. You may relish sleeping on the ground but I don’t.”  I snap. Something he is such an idiot.

He turns to watch me, calm. He has darkness under his eyes, and he looks strained. I clench my jaw. Does he still think he has to manage everything himself? It went so well the first time, didn’t it?

“Tomorrow we start with Athenril. I am going to get some new hay.”

Yes, he  **still**  does.

Gamlen snickers. I am about to point how unlikely it is that he will manage to find hay or really anything else in this cesspit of a city, but he doesn’t wait for me.

I turn my back to the closing door and march into the cabinet. I almost bang my head on the doorframe.

Mother and Aveline are speaking in the other room.

I wait for Bethany’s voice.

I close my eyes and let myself fall on the ground, hugging my knees to my chest. Bethany always seemed to sense me, to know where I was. I always lost when we played hide-and-seek. Perhaps it was magic, because I could never do the same with her.

For a moment I choke on the wish she would find me, even now. That she would come and put her hand on my head.

I shrugged it off last time she did so. Claimed I didn’t need  _babying_.

~~I didn’t deserve her.~~

I try to make sure nobody hears me crying. Mother doesn’t need this on top of everything else.  ~~Gawain isn’t crying. He is out being useful.~~

Of course, Gawain comes back with the hay and fresh food.


End file.
